We're In The Army - Nine Months

We are happy to report that Emily has been crawling for the past couple of weeks. It looks more like an Army crawl with one or both legs dragging behind her but she's getting the hang of it. She's also responding to our prompts with babbling or loud but happy screams. Our updates include:

• Eating food three times per day at 7am, 11am, and 5pm supplemented by formula after each feeding. She hasn't eaten a food she hasn't liked yet. We've added rice rusks and yogurt bites to her diet and she does well with them even though she doesn't have any teeth yet.
• A couple weeks ago she dropped her evening nap and now sleeps for about an hour in the morning and two in the afternoon on a good day.
• She can get wherever she wants to be including the stack of books on the bottom shelf of one of our end tables. Her "crawling" makes for a very dirty belly no matter how many times we clean the floor.

•  Her vocalizations are becoming more varied and loud. She makes noise to mimic us, when she's happy, and to get our attention.
• She's still a very happy baby who loves to sleep at night. She's usually asleep by 7pm and wakes up between 6-7am.
• She enjoys daddy's goofy dancing partially because she doesn't realize how bad it really is.
• Baths are fun for her no matter what her mood is. She loves to splash and play with her rubber ducky when she doesn't have it in her mouth.
• We're excited for some new toys at Christmas because she needs more and more stimulation these days and can get bored and whines more easily than she used to. Her new favorite toy is a plastic key chain with keys and a fob that plays car sounds. She loves to put it in her mouth and push the horn sound button over and over and over and...
• The Hicks' came to visit for Thanksgiving and provided Emily with a new audience. She appreciated their willingness to travel all the way to Iowa to celebrate the holiday and her dad's birthday. She even got a onesie from her Granana Mae with her photo on it.

• We head to Minnesota for the Christmas holiday tomorrow and have her nine month appointment when we get back to Cedar Rapids. We're excited to see how much she has grown and developed. As with many of us during this time of year, her pants (12 month size) are growing tighter every day.